


Meeting in the E.R.

by Melime



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medical, F/F, First Dates, First Meetings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-30
Updated: 2018-01-30
Packaged: 2019-03-11 15:43:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13527423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime
Summary: Janet is working in the E.R. when someone comes in having been hurt while rescuing a cat.





	Meeting in the E.R.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [brinnanza](https://archiveofourown.org/users/brinnanza/gifts).
  * Translation into Português brasileiro available: [Encontro no Pronto-Socorro](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13527435) by [Melime GreenLeaf (Melime)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime%20GreenLeaf)



> Brinnanza asked for Sam/Janet meeting in the E.R./A&E AU.
> 
> I think it's important to point out that, dammit I'm a lawyer not a doctor. My only experiences with hospitals are have been a very sick toddler and watching ER since it first aired. Also, this AU is kinda based on The Night Shift, but mostly in the sense that it's a hospital with a lot of people that used to be military.

Janet couldn’t remember a time her life hadn’t been this chaotic. Certainly not since med school, but she wasn’t sure before then things were any calmer. Probably nowhere near the past couple decades, to the point a day that didn’t involve her running around during her entire shift stood out.

The E.R. was calm that night, no one had eaten things they shouldn’t - or masturbated using things they shouldn’t -, no cut off limbs or appendages, and surprisingly no blowtorch incidents despite the cold.

She was taking the opportunity to get a headstart on that night’s paperwork when a nurse showed up with a patient file.

“You’ll like this one. Filed under people shouldn’t do dumb things,” she said, handing the file to Janet.

“The night won’t be complete without one,” Janet said, glancing at the file.

“She’s in trauma one. Oh, and she’s cute.”

Janet waved a dismissing hand. Her love life was pretty disastrous if everyone felt the need to pitch in, as if she was going to use the emergency room as a dating pool.

She went to trauma one, at least the case seemed easy enough, a couple stitches, maybe a couple shots. As far as behaviour that lacked self-preservation went, it wasn’t too bad.

Janet opened the door and right, the nurse that a point, this, Janet glanced at the file again, Samantha was pretty cute. Even if her hand was covered by a bloody bandage.

“What do we have here?” she asked, pulling the stool to sit.

“Well,” Samantha started, rubbing the back of her head with her good hand, “let’s just say it wasn’t my proudest moment.”

Janet smiled at that, taking care to lower her face so it was hidden. “Whatever it is, I promise you I’ve heard worse.”

She lifted the bandage slowly. The blood was starting to clot, but it wouldn’t be enough to close the wound, it would need stitches for sure.

“A car engine, a cat, and my hand got into a fight, two out of three left in one piece,” she said.

Janet snorted, needing a second to recover her control. It wasn’t the story itself, but the way she said it. “I’m sorry.”

Samantha smiled. “Don’t worry. I would laugh if I were in your place. Hell, I’ll probably laugh about this once it stops hurting like hell.”

“Did you bring the cat along to check for rabies?” Janet said, looking for a change of subject while she started cleaning the wound.

“No, my brother took her to the vet.”

“Was it your cat?”

“No, she… I should probably tell the story from the start. I guess getting only to the relevant information isn’t as easy as it sounds. My brother heard a strange noise when he went to start his car and asked me to check. I open the hood and see the tip of a cat’s tail, she must have been cold and climbed inside. I tried to take her out but she was stuck, so I had take off some parts to get to her. She must have panicked and attacked me as soon as she could. The poor thing was starving and freezing, so my brother took her to the vet.”

Alright, it wasn’t the smartest possible thing to do, but of all the ways she saw people hurt, this was actually pretty reasonable. She probably refrained from telling the nurse the whole story, and although Janet could see why she was embarrassed, it was the decent thing to do. Even calling professionals in this weather wouldn’t have been a good idea, since they were needed for worse things.

“She’ll have to be checked in a couple days, but if she isn’t presenting any symptoms now, the chances are good she didn’t have rabies.”

“I’ve seen animals with rabies, she didn’t look anything like it. She was even calm at the car, after we got her wrapped in a towel. I think she was just scared. Who wouldn’t be, hurt and with heavy machinery running all around them.” She touched the left side of her body absently, eyes losing focus only for a moment. “Anyway,” she said, shaking her head and snapping out of it, “my brother asked the vet to keep us posted.”

Janet wanted to ask her about it, there was clearly a story there, but she didn’t want to intrude, since it didn’t seem relevant to the problem that brought her there.

“If anything changes, you can come back here, we have a supply of rabies vaccines. Just bring the vet’s results and have someone at the reception pull your file.”

Samantha nodded, then she looked at the cleaned wound. “That’s going to need stitches, right?”

“Not many, but yes. Don’t worry, it probably won’t leave a scar.”

“Scars don’t worry me, but thank you for trying to reassure me. You don’t have to do that, I’ve seen a lot worse.”

“Do you have any medical training?” Janet asked, for lack of something better to say.

She shrugged. “Only emergency field medical training, from back when I was in Air Force.”

That explained a lot. Janet should have realized sooner, several of her colleagues were ex-military of some kind.

“Really? I was an army doctor for a few years.”

Janet gave her a local anesthetic to start with the stitches.

“Why did you leave?”

“I told back when we were not supposed to,” she said lightly. It had been a long time ago, she didn’t have a problem saying that anymore. “You?”

“Medical discharge,” she said, but didn’t elaborate. 

Janet didn’t push her. “So I guess I don’t need to tell you this will pull a little.”

Samantha smiled at her. “Do your worst.”

\---

When Janet didn’t hear from Samantha in the following week, she assumed that meant everything was fine. In that sense, the E.R. was a lot like the army, if she didn’t see her patients again, it was probably a good sign. She mostly worried about the ones she saw too often, like that guy who came in every other week convinced that he was an alien.

“Fraiser, incoming on the roof,” Jennifer said, running by her.

Janet quickly followed her, managing to catch the same elevator. “What do we have?”

“Two patients, male and female, early twenties, involved in a car crash, couldn’t be stabilized on the chopper.”

The elevator door opened.

“We don’t have any O.R. available,” Janet informed. She knew that too well, she had a patient with a broken leg that would need pins and that been waiting for hours now.

They walked to the landing pad, at a safe distance. The helicopter was in the process of landing, so they had to yell to keep talking.

“I passed Lam in the hallway, she was just walking out of surgery, she can take one.”

“Alright. Which one do you want?”

“I’ll take the first.”

They rushed to the helicopter, heads low. One of the paramedics helped Jennifer with the first gurney, then the pilot moved to help Janet.

“Female, 23, responsive at the scene, crashed on the way here, we were able to revive her,” yelled the pilot.

Janet could barely hear her with the helicopter wings.

“Her pulse is faint, help me to the elevator,” she yelled back.

Janet rushed with her, she had to get the girl stabilized, and fast, otherwise she might not last it to surgery.

\---

Janet was beat. Her patient was finally in surgery, but far from being out of the woods. After working on her for an hour, and having to restart her heart twice, Janet was exhausted, all she wanted was some coffee.

She went to the break room, and by a miracle, someone had actually made fresh coffee.

“Oh, whoever did this, I love you,” she said, closing her eyes and hugging a mug of still boiling coffee. Just what she needed.

“At least you are easy to please,” came a voice from the other side of the room.

Janet turned, and there was Samantha, except now she was dressed like one of the rescue pilots. Suddenly, the pilot that spoke to her earlier sounded very familiar.

“Samantha? What are you doing here?” she asked, then regretted it. Terrible question, the answer was obviously getting coffee.

“Sam, please,” she said. “I just dropped another patient here, so I’m waiting for the next call. How’s the couple from earlier?”

“The man is still in surgery, but out of danger. The woman was just taken to surgery, too early to tell.”

Sam nodded. “It was a really bad crash. The car was completely destroyed, we nearly had to amputate the man’s right leg to get him out.”

“Keller told me he had a piece of the gear sticking out of his leg, but that she was hopeful that Lam could save the leg.”

Neither of them knew what to say after that, so they stayed in silence. When it became too uncomfortable, Janet looked for anything to say.

“I didn’t know you worked here.”

“Today is my first day. I have to say I was missing the action.”

“How’s the hand?” she asked, pointing at Sam’s previously injured hand, covered by her gloves.

Sam looked at her hand, then shrugged, taking the glove off. “It’s healing well, thank you for that.”

Janet smiled. “No risk of rabies then?”

Sam took her phone of her pocket. “No, she’s fine, I took her home a couple days ago,” she said, showing Janet a picture of her cat.

“She’s so cute!”

Sam was about to say something, but then she was paged. “Sorry, I have to go.”

“Have a safe trip,” she said, and as soon as Sam left, she repeated that to herself. “Have a safe trip, what kind of an idiot am I?”

\---

Janet’s shift was just over, and all she wanted to do was to get home. Scratch that, all she wanted was to go out with her friends like they did every other Friday night, but both Carolyn and Jennifer decided to cancel on her just a few minutes ago, both giving her ridiculous excuses.

“Uh, hi there,” Sam said from the locker room door.

“Oh, hi, Sam. Do you need a change of clothes?”

Over the past few weeks, she and Sam had gotten to know each other, even if only at work. Janet liked her, although despite what her colleagues seemed to think, there was nothing there. Yet, at least.

“No, strangely enough Lam wouldn’t let me leave after my shift ended half an hour ago, and then Keller told me the weirdest story. Something about how girls’ night out was canceled last minute and that you were both free and probably disappointed,” she said, resting her shoulder on the wall, all charm and amusement.

Janet blushed. “I’m so sorry, I had no idea they were going to do that. I’ll make them apologize.”

Sam smiled. “Don’t worry about it. To be honest, my brother is this close to faking an emergency just to see if he can slip you my number.”

“Oh. Oh! You mean…?” she started, not sure as to what she wanted to say.

Sam gave her a coy smile. “I mean, if you want? At the very least it would stop your friends before they try to kidnap us.”

“I want to say you’re exaggerating, but to be honest, they would.”

“So, what do you say?”

Janet decided she might as well take a chance. “Sure, as long as I don’t have to ride in that deathtrap of yours.”

“You do realize my other ride is a helicopter, right?”

“And you do realize that no one who works in an E.R. is ever going to ride a bike, right?”

Sam shrugged. “After being shot out of the sky, they don’t seem that bad.”

Janet had heard that story, but not from Sam. Another one of the pilots knew Sam while she was still in the service, and told Janet about the terrible accident that left Sam stranded and trapped inside the remains of the helicopter for two days. The pilot told her Sam lost one kidney and function on the other, but Janet knew from her file she had normal function on one kidney, so she assumed the loss of function was temporary. At any rate, it wasn’t a surprise she was discharged.

“You may have a point, but my worst experience with a vehicle was when broke my arm the first time I rode a bicycle without the training wheels.”

Sam laughed. “Now I can see why you don’t like bikes.”

“A compromise: your bike can fit on the back of my truck.”

“It’s a date then. I’ll let you finish changing, meet you at the parking lot?”

“I’ll be there in a moment.”

As soon as Sam left, Janet lowered her eyes, smiling. Right now, she didn’t know if she wanted to yell at her friends or thank them for this. The outcome of the night would decide that.


End file.
